I was trying to be on time for the daily 9 a.m. meeting, but was cutting it too close. Mysteriously, I succumbed to an urge to get a particular book, title unknown, from the library before I left.

I had to climb onto the bookshelves, which seemed gigantic and crowded to me. I crawled over books as though they were boulders on a steep mountain slope. Some were so high or placed so close to an edge that they seemed insurmountable. Time was ticking away, and I was tiring rapidly. I could not haul myself any further over all these book obstacles. It was horrifying to me that I was going to miss the unimportant three-minute meeting, but inside I was afraid that I had deliberately trapped myself forever to get out of all of them.

I woke up early, exhausted and a little panicked.

In reality, I was late for the following day’s meeting.